Fail
by LonelyWoods92
Summary: Time may heal all wounds, but the scars will always remain. AU One-Shot JJ/Reid


**Title:** Fail

**Rating:** T (Mentions of Rape/Attempted Murder/Language)

**Pairing:** Jennifer Jareau/Spencer Reid

**Summary:** Time may heal all wounds, but the scars will always remain.

Jennifer Jareau was a woman on a mission. Tonight, after years of being seen as the girl next door, was finally going to be the night that she made her best friend see her as something more. She put on her best lace underwear, a skimpy skirt and revealing top, giving herself a look over in the vanity mirror across her dorm room. There was no way Spencer Reid was getting out of this one.

They had met in elementary school, and as cliché as it may sound, they lived directly across the street from one another. His parents had made him come with them when they came to say hello to the new neighbors, and she was just excited to finally see someone her own age. The two played outside for hours while the parents talked inside, just capturing bugs. Spencer was a genius, at least, to JJ he was. He could tell her every kind of bug they found and where it originated from. That summer, they spent more time together than JJ had ever thought possible. They went swimming, hiking, camping, and pretty much every activity under the sun. Then school came.

It suddenly occurred to JJ that Spencer was a nerd, considered unpopular and weird by the rest of their 5th grade peers. It seemed like an incomprehensible idea to her that her best friend could be anything but amazingly awesome. So, when people picked on him the first few days of school, she stood up for him. It pretty much shocked the whole school, but it was a good kind of shocked. Spencer didn't get picked on, and when he was bullied, things got ugly real fast. JJ was a fighter, and had an excellent knack of kicking people in very sensitive areas of their bodies. Though it lead to many trips to the principal's office, everyone seemed to get the memo. By 7th grade, everyone knew that Spencer Reid was untouchable.

High school was a different story. The two friends didn't quite spend as much time together as they used to. Spencer's family moved across town, JJ was getting into soccer, and time together was usually spent studying down at the library than having fun. When she got a boyfriend, things got even worse between them. They only saw each other in the halls, for brief moments where they didn't even acknowledge each other. That was a bad time for JJ to think about, especially because of what happened next.

Luke, her boyfriend back then, had raped her. He had wanted more than she was willing to give, so he took it forcefully. She could still remember every detail of that awful night, and how he had tried to kill her by putting his slimy hands on her neck and squeezing until she blacked out. When she woke up, she was in a ditch on the side of the road right outside of town. That motherfucker had actually tried to dispose of her body.

Sore, exhausted, and broken, the young blonde woman had slowly made her way into town. She knew she couldn't go home, not after the horrible fight she had with her parents about Luke yesterday. Not knowing anyplace else to go, Jennifer Jareau ended up on Spencer Reid's doorstep.

He had a friend, Ethan she thought his name was, over at the time. It hurt her even more to know how much they had grown apart; that she didn't even know who his friends were anymore.

She collapsed into his arms, sobbing uncontrollably, unable to speak because she couldn't control herself. She heard faintly how Spencer asked his friend to leave before he picked her up and brought her into his room to lay down on the bed. That, of course, had freaked her out even more. For a split second, she was positive that it was going to happen all over again. Sensing her distress, Spencer simply pulled up the covers to her chin and dragged a chair from the living room next to the bed. He held her hand until eventually her sobs subsided.

She told him everything that night. He was the one to help her tell her parents and go to the police. He was the one that beat the living shit out of Luke before the police found and arrested him. He was still there for her, even when they hadn't been best friends in months. That was about to change.

Weeks after the incident, JJ was still living in his house, afraid to go back to her own and have to go through her nightmares alone. After an extremely bad nightmare, they had stayed up talking for hours. It was only then that she realized the bruises covering Spencer's entire body. She, being the best friend that she was, demanded to know who had done this to him. He reluctantly told her about a kid at school, Tobias Hankel, who had been beating him up since sophomore year. JJ had once again failed her best friend.

The next day, JJ and the entire soccer team put Toby in the hospital. Mysteriously, no one had any idea who had done it, so no one got suspended. It was easy to assume that Tobias never messed with Spencer Reid again.

JJ got a soccer scholarship to Caltech, and Spencer's large genius brain got him in without the blink of an eye, which led them to where she was now.

Sitting in the chair to her vanity, JJ applied dark red lipstick. The bruises on her throat had healed long before now, but she threw on a scarf anyway. If there was one thing that JJ had learned throughout her life, it was that bruises may heal over time, but scars will stay with you forever.

Picking up the Psychology book that Spencer was going to help her study tonight during their study date from her desk, JJ grabbed her purse off her closet door and walked out the door, turning off the light as she went. Tonight, Jennifer Jareau was a woman on a mission, and she was never going to fail again.

**Hey guys! Sorry this one is so short (1,026 words) but I just felt like all that needed to be said was said (if that makes any sense). I didn't really have any inspiration from a criminal minds episode, but I still think it's pretty good! Tell me what you think (AKA: Review!)**


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